A driver encounters many problems while parking vehicles in a huge car park. For instance, in a crowded huge multi-story car park, it is difficult for a driver to remember where his/her vehicle is parked. Often it is a frustrating experience to search for his/her vehicle. Quite often, it is difficult for a driver to locate an empty parking space to park his/her vehicle in a huge car park, despite being informed that numerous parking spaces are available. Precious time is wasted by drivers when he/she cannot remember where the vehicle is parked or not being in a position to trace an empty parking space. The present car parking systems are not efficient enough for a car park operator to ease the problems mentioned above. Slow vehicle retrieval and delay in searching for empty lots results in problems, such as delayed exit of vehicles, increased car park jams, less effective parking capacity, and poor car park utilisation. Furthermore, motorists are at great inconvenience, and may even result in discouraging others from parking in such car parks. For the car park operators, these problems translate directly to revenue loss. This in turn, reduces the revenue of the shop keepers or businessmen who are present in a building having such a car park.
Presently, some car parks have addressed the above problems to some extent. Some car parks provide empty lot information. For example, a car park is divided into many different zones and vehicle detection sensors are installed between each zone to count the numbers of vehicles coming in and going out of a zone. These vehicle sensors provide information to derive the number of vehicles parked inside each zone. Other systems involve the installation of vehicle detection sensors (infra red, proximity, or light sensors, etc) for each parking lot, thus providing parking lot availability information. However, the existing car park systems have many drawbacks, including inability to determine when specific lots become available, high infrastructural costs, high per car park lot equipment, high installation and maintenance costs. Moreover, existing methods are based on the principle of counting of vehicles or the occupation of lots.